The Abangares Eco-Museum usually doesn’t appear in the lists of “places you must visit” in tourism sites, many people, in fact, don’t even know it exists, but it is a wonderful place full of history and that offers visitors an insight to what the Tico “Gold Fever” was like back in the late XIX century and beginning of the XX century.

The museum was founded in 1991 and it stands in the same place were a gold mine was discovered back in 1884 by Juan Alvarado Acosta.

“Alvarado sold the mine in 1887 to his three brothers, Vicente, Paulino and Rafael Acosta, who named it Tres Hermanos (Three Brothers). In 1889 it was sold to the company ‘Anglo American Exploration Development Company Limited’; eventually it came to be the property of the Abangares Gold Fields of Costa Rica, founded by US businessman Minor Cooper Keith”, information offered by the System of Cultural Information of Costa Rica (Sicultura).

This mine marked the beginning of the exploration in the mountains of Tilaran, and other mines were created; this activity continued to grow and promoted the development of this region; people would come from different places looking for gold.

Keith’s company abandoned the region in 1931 in part because of the scarcity of gold deposits and due to the Great Depression in the USA.

The museum which was abandoned for several years, underwent a transformation and now showcases different tools and equipment used in mining during that time, the remains of the old mine of course, and a photograph and video exhibit that helps tell the story of everything that happened in this place years ago.